gender-variant populations

24/02/2009

So after my post on the prevalence of gender-variance, I thought it would be interesting to calculate actual numbers of transsexual and transgender people, just to get an idea of how big a population (constituency? ~_^) we’re talking about here.

Considering the contention around who actually has the right numbers though, I decided to calculate population separately based on each individual investigation or report, listing them in descending order with the oldest report [Tsoi88] at the top, down to [Reed08], the most recent, at the bottom. I know it’s not ideal, but at least it does help to give an indication of what various authorities are saying the populations are. Unfortunately it’s still pretty-much up to each of us to decide for ourselves who we’re gonna listen to. At least until all the big brains and official types can agree.

Before getting started, just a recap of the assumptions and rules I’m using in my calculations:

Overall population statistics are assumed to be a 50% split between assigned male and assigned female.

Adult population aged 18-60 is estimated at two thirds of total population, 67%.

You’ll notice that most of these studies focus exclusively on Male-to-Female (MtF) transsexual people, specifically post-op. This is done mainly because it’s easy – you can point to a definite, irreversible change and obtain statistical data from surgeons fairly easily. Obviously this precludes gender-variant people who can’t have surgery due to financial or health restrictions, or who do not entirely identify as transsexual.

Reliable statistics for the Female-to-Male (FtM) population are much harder to come by as phalloplasty is a much more expensive, dangerous and generally unsuccessful procedure than vaginoplasty. Consequently, many transmen opt not to have surgery, and so never become part of a fairly easily counted population. Historically the ratio has been about one FtM individual for every 2.5 MtF people. Where there’s no data I’ve used this ratio to extrapolate numbers for comparison, though some more recent studies are indicating a higher ratio.

These statistics tend to assume that the majority of the population will have access to information about transsexuality as well as the means to medically transition, since they are based on research in developed countries such as the Netherlands and the United States. The reality in less developed countries is unlikely to correspond to these models. Populations are more likely to be ignorant of the realities or even existence of gender variance, not to mention have little chances of ever having the resources to transition.

So all calculations are for adult populations between the ages of 18 and 60 only, with assigned male and assigned female split exactly 50-50. All population statistics are latest census or estimated figures as per Wikipedia.

I’ve done two sets of calculations, the first based on the lowest prevalence statistics quoted in each respective report, which represents people seeking to transition or already having done so, and where available, a second set based on upper estimates as being representative of total populations of all gender-variant people.